Pedigree problems are typical tasks in school genetics classes. However, they are perceived as difficult and often are not successfully completed. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine relevant factors that might have an impact on success in pedigree analysis. Based on previous research, we investigate the influence of the…

Student problems (preconceptions, errors, and learner-specific approaches) that arise when planning and conducting experiments are relevant for lesson planning and the further development of teaching practice overall. student problems are understood as a learning opportunity. So far, little attention has been paid to the relationships between…

The purpose of this study is to find a way to improve students' performance to solve physics problems by inducing changes in emotion via immediate feedback. To this end, in 2016, we conducted an experiment, doing an interview and survey consecutively. The participants were five second-year male students attending a private high school in Seoul,…

Pre-service physics teachers often do not recognise the relevance for their future career in their university content knowledge courses. A lower perceived relevance can, however, have a negative effect on their motivation and on their academic success. Several intervention studies have been undertaken with the goal to increase this perceived…

In science education, context-based learning is mostly based on problem-oriented tasks [Gilbert, J. K. (2006). On the nature of "context" in chemical education. "International Journal of Science Education", 28(9), 957-976]. Therefore, a relevant question is, how do students integrate the information given in the task into their…

This study focuses on the teachers' predictions of the students' performances -- in particular the middle-low achievers -- while solving tasks testing inquiry competencies. The tasks come from PISA science. More specifically we study science teachers' predictions for several aspects: levels of difficulty of the tasks, the potential sources of…

We present a quantitative model for predicting the level of difficulty subjects will experience with specific problems. The model explicitly accounts for the number of subproblems a problem can be broken into and the difficultly of each subproblem. Although the model builds on previously published models, it is uniquely suited for blending with…